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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23662804">Words that Burn the Tongue</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Queen_Of_Sarcasm/pseuds/Queen_Of_Sarcasm'>Queen_Of_Sarcasm</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dungeons &amp; Dragons - All Media Types, Original Work</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 23:53:19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,052</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23662804</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Queen_Of_Sarcasm/pseuds/Queen_Of_Sarcasm</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Words always come easier to people who haven't had to worry about their language being considered evil. (The Crown and their experiences with the languages that they speak). </p><p> </p><p>(Inspired by - https://archiveofourown.org/works/19706494/chapters/46637101<br/>A Thousand Words For Snow by Schistosity)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Lily Ash</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lily was born in a home full of different languages. She used to be confused when she would be brought onto the streets and the only langauge that she would hear was not the ones that she grew up with. None of the people who she saw as she hid her face in Juna’s chest had the accents that she had grown up with. Their accents, or the lack of ones, were the exact opposite of the soft melodic tongue curls of Juna, the crisp high notes of Ruscus’s voice especially when he spoke Infernal. </p><p>Infernal was a rough language with words that sounded like a punch to the sternum but if you focused in hard enough, you could hear broken notes of music that sounded like someone was throwing a tuba down a set of stairs. Ruscus taught Lily his mother language whenever he got the chance and it came in handy when both of them had to pull off their tricks in order to get food for everyone at the orphanage. Lily learned Infernal so she could transform into a tiefling, a shorter female Ruscus, and so that no one would question why she was there. They were siblings in heart, and if they needed to, they could look like they were siblings in blood too. </p><p>(When Alex asked Lily to teach her woodcarving, Lily had to think hard before everything she said in order to not slip into Infernal. Her mind just went back to the late-night woodcarving lessons with Ruscus, her older brother that she would never see again).</p><p>Lily learned Common and Elvish from Juna. Juna, a woman, who as a half-elf, spoke both languages with ease. Lily was forced to learn Common so that the rest of the village wouldn’t suspect that she wasn’t who she said she was. Lily learned Elvish accidentally at first, from the lullabies that Juna sang every night so that Lily could get to sleep. Lily picked up more from the cooking staff in the castle who spoke in faster than Lily had ever heard. The words sounding like a flute being played in an empty field and all the words combining into one line. The Elvish came in handy when Snapdragon and Jasmine were dumped at the orphanage, who had only each other and their mother language for years, and who now had a whole family that could speak it and who could keep them safe.</p><p>(The lessons in Common came in handy since everyone and their mother spoke it. The Elvish went unused for years, except when Lily woke up in the middle of the night from the terrors and shadows that haunted her and the only way that she could get back to sleep was singing the lullabies that her “mother”, Juna, would sing to her).</p><p>Giant was the hardest language to learn. Lily’s only teachers were books and a 9-year-old Goliath who just wanted to go outside and water his plants. Giant was a language of scratches and pounding that formed together to make words. (In any world, it would be considered German). Lily pushed on though because after a day of pretending to be a “simple human” doing something that was unordinary felt right.</p><p>(When the Crown had to translate an ancient text that was in Giant, Talia immediately offered to do it but Lily did it instead since Talia’s hands were shaking too much from the spells that she had to cast yesterday. Everyone tried to ask Lily where she learned how to read and speak Giant and without even thinking Lily lied and said she had an old friend who spoke it even if the truth was that she just wanted to talk to her brother as she held him while he cried, and as she cried too, from sympathy or exhaustion she never knew).</p><p>Undercommon was the only langauge that Lily hated. She hated it because it was the only language that she didn’t have to learn. The moment she woke up after falling in the lake of the liquid void, the language filled her head. Words that she never had even seen before came out of her pen when she wrote her diaries. It felt…good on her tongue, which scared Lily more than she would like to admit. The shadows whispered words of Undercommon every night when she tried to sleep. </p><p>(2 years later as she stood before the broken god, one word of Undercommon poured from her tongue as she was asked why she protected the people that laid at her feet. “They are my domum, my home, now please,  just fucking die already.”)</p><p>Lily would also lay in bed sometimes and wonder if Changelings had ever had a native language. She wondered if her ancestors had ever had a moment when they had not needed to become someone that they weren’t. She liked to think that Changelings had not even needed to speak, that they could just look at each other and say everything that they needed to say. The idea of being true without the pain of speaking was something that Lily wished she could do. However, as she laid in the pile of her team, her second family, she heard their shallow, sleeping breaths. Talia’s deep, calming breaths that caused the flower crown that sat upon her head to slowly slip off. The quiet, almost worryingly shallow breath of Athena as they were curled up against Lily’s side, their ears twitching with every movement. The rustling and mutters from Alex as she moved around, her arms wrapped around them all, with a protective, tight grasp. The snoring and snorts from Atam (who would never admit that he did them) as a light jingle came from the strings wrapped around his horns.</p><p>As Lily laid in a pile with her family, and as she moved to have her arms wrapped Athena’s little body, she knew that she already knew what the native Changeling language was, </p><p>the language of silence and love.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Talia Grove</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Talia could have learned any language that she wanted.</p><p>The castle’s library had books of every language that had ever been used. Old tomes with dust all over the front that had Draconic, Slyvan and Celestial scribbled in. Newer books that you had to drag from the piles that the scholars brought in, the pages inside full of Elvish, Gnomish and of course, Common.</p><p>Mama and Pops spoke almost 5 languages each, something that Talia admired, even though they learned it for diplomacy and not for the reason that Talia wanted to learn languages. She wanted to learn so that she can understand other people that she met in her life and so that her music could be understood by all. </p><p>Talia never really had to learn Common. She never remembered a time when she wasn’t in the care of Mama and Pops. She knew she had a family before them and that most Firbolg eventually had to “learn” Common, but Talia never had to deal with that problem. As she became the queen after her parents’ deaths, Common became her only defense. Her words of strength for her people, her words of confidence for her diplomatic meetings and her words of love that were hidden in every lyric she sang.</p><p>(She wonders if her sister ever got to learn Common, if she ended up with a family that spoke it or if she ended up with other Firbolg who had no use for it. She feared that it was neither. She feared that her sister had never had anyone to speak to and that she never got to learn anything at all.)</p><p>Giant was a language that she learned during the war. Tarina, her kingdom, needed allies against the drow armies. The closest allies were the goliaths of the Kinghorn Mountains. She knew a bit of Giant since Firbolg are descendants of the ancient Giants and her parents allowed her to learn about her culture. However, during the strategy meetings with the goliath leaders, her Giant became more refined and began to lose its cold, formal edge. Her Tarinan accent stopped overwhelming all her words and her Giant now sounded no different than anyone else’s.</p><p>(Talia found out that Lily spoke Giant when Lily had to translate the scrolls since Talia’s hands were shaking too hard from the fact that she used so much of her magic to save her team, her children, from the monsters. Talia now began to whisper little Giant comments to Lily every time they had to talk to someone who was an asshole. Lily would always do her little half-giggle which made Talia happy because watching her daughter laugh was always nice).</p><p>Elvish was the only language that Talia had to use all of her 450 years of life to learn, as she would laid in bed with her soon-to-be-wife, over 250 years ago, Talia learned the Elvish words for love and comfort. She learned them as she ran her hands through Rhea’s red hair while she gave her a soft kiss on the lips. Talia used those same words in her vows at their wedding and as her kingdom celebrated the marriage of their queen(s).</p><p>When they finally adopted a child, Talia learned from her love for her daughter, the Elvish word for child and protection. Talia also learned two words of Celestial, all that she could understand from the words that her daughter mumbled as a baby.</p><p>Agapi - love, diamoni - stay.</p><p>(Talia always thought that her Elvish had a weird accent but when the Crowns were forced to attend a ball that was full to the brim of narcissistic elven nobles, every one of them told her that for a “non-elf”-none of them knew what a Firbolg was-she had pretty amazing Elvish. It was like she was a native speaker which Talia didn’t know if she should be proud of but it made her old soul feel good to teach kids who have an ego that anyone can do whatever they want).</p><p>Goblin was a language that Talia was always interested in. Her fellow nobles would have been disgusted at the thought that she would want to talk with “such low-lives”. Talia never gave a fuck. Her economic advisor was an older male goblin, Kens, who was one of Talia’s best friends and from him, she learned Goblin, with its scratchy vowels and creaky sentences. When Kens died, he was given a beautiful funeral, and Talia gave a speech in Goblin, and even if people gave her a burning glare for it, she said it anyway.</p><p>(Goblin came in handy when the Crowns had to spy on a Goblin clan that was planning to attack a local town that they were paid to protect. Talia didn’t like hearing Kens’ langauge be used to say words like attack and kill but it just made the mission even easier. That night, after the Crowns had been forced to kill the Goblins, she whispered an apology, a prayer, in case Kens could hear). </p><p>Talia began her journey looking for her sister, who was part of a family that she had never met and Talia could have just taken a direct path to where she thought her sister was but Talia had been alive for centuries and in time, she had learned that just following your gut and letting things happen always brought you to where you needed to be. </p><p>She was right.</p><p>It brought her to her second family, her adopted children. </p><p>Her eldest, Alex, with her bitter attitude that hid her protective golden heart. Her second child, Athena, who always refused to accept the fact that they were good, and they were the smartest person in the world. Her second youngest, Atam, who had a glamour of smiles and flirting but who would punch a person that would look at his family sideways. Her youngest, Lily, was full of nervousness and anxiety but when you let her calm, she was the kindest and sweetest girl.</p><p>Talia loved all of them like her blood because they had all heal each others’ wounds so if you thought about, they technically were.</p><p>Morbid thought, but hey, no one had ever told Talia that she was normal, and that was fine by her.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This is the first work in a series I am creating based on a D&amp;D party based on characters that I have created. I have plans for the world and the characters. I will be creating a guide soon so that information on these characters will be more easily known.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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